


In Her Place

by fangirlingingeneralidk



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Suicide mentions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-03
Updated: 2017-09-03
Packaged: 2018-12-23 13:03:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11990355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fangirlingingeneralidk/pseuds/fangirlingingeneralidk
Summary: The brothers come across a demon with an unusual request. Will they listen? (Set during s3)A/N: Rated T for suicide mentions. If you are uncomfortable with the topic of suicide, this story is not for you. If you are considering suicide, PLEASE get help. This story is not meant to romanticize/misrepresent suicide in any way. If you have a complaint, tell me.





	In Her Place

They caught her by surprise. The brothers loaded her into the trunk of their car and brought her somewhere less likely to be interrupted.

She awoke tied to a chair in what looked like someone's living room. She had no gag, and so she opened her mouth, but a deep voice said, "I wouldn't do that."

She spun her head to face the source. A man who could have been younger if not for his line of work, ridiculously attractive and wearing a leather jacket over about five layers of plaid flannel. _In this weather?_ she wanted to ask.

"Why not?" she said instead.

"Well, you could scream if you wanted to, but there's no one around for miles but me and Sammy. Maybe Bobby, but I'll let you wonder about him. Still want to scream? Go ahead, just leave enough juice in your voice box to answer some questions."

"Can I ask some too?" She didn't wait for an answer. "Who are you, where am I, and why?"

He laughed without humor. "Dean Winchester, at your service. You're at a classified location on your back to hell, which ought to answer your third question."

" _What?!_ "

"Oh, don't play innocent. You're in a devil's trap right now, if you'll look up. Sam's looking up the proper exorcism as we speak, and then we'll get to business. But first- do you know anything about someone calling herself Lilith?"

"Who? What are you talking about? Exorcism? Are you insane?" She tested the bonds holding her to the chair, but she was held fast.

"Christo," he snapped. Her eyes went black, and she sighed.

"Oh all right," she said slowly. "I'll just let you know, I don't know whoever you're looking for. And there's really no need to exorcise me."

"Right, we're just going to release you to hurt more innocent people. How many have you killed?"

"None," she said, and something about the way she said it made Dean pause. She looked at the ceiling and yes, there was the devil's trap. If he didn't listen, she was trapped. Doomed. "I haven't done anything wrong, please, you've got to believe me."

"Demons lie. All the time. That's what they do. Why would I believe you?" His voice was that of one who had been lied to so often he could no longer remember how to trust, and she knew that would make it much harder to get through to him. She'd first have to find a crack in the walls he'd built around himself. And she thought she knew the best way to do it.

"Because I'm not lying. Think about it, there haven't been any deaths recently or- or freak accidents, or anything. I didn't _do_ anything."

"But if you're not here to cause destruction, why _are_ you here?" Dean asked. The fact that he'd even humor her was a good sign, she noted.

She paused before answering. "I just wanted to get out, Dean."

"Out?" But he knew what she meant.

"Out of hell."

The word made him suck in breath, just a little. The crack. She pressed on.

"You don't know what it's like there. Not yet, anyway, from what I hear. You'll see. The pain- all the time, pain... And the noise and the heat and the smell-" She cut off; she was unable to go on. She broke eye contact and stared at her bound hands.

He couldn't look her in the eye, either. She took a moment to collect herself. _Deep breath_ , she told herself.

"And then the gates opened," she said softly, "and I saw my chance. You'd take it too, if you'd been in my shoes. You're going to be there a long time, _Dean_ -" she spat his name like a curse- "and after you've been there as long as I was in that pit, you'll _wish_ some idiot like you would come along and let you out. So out I came."

"And possessed that girl," Dean said, after a short pause. He cleared his throat. "Your vessel. She's dead now. That's a body count."

"Wrong on two accounts. Number one being: this vessel is not dead."

"She will be soon, then," said Dean. "If we perform the exorcism immediately, she might live."

"And here we come to point number two. She doesn't want to."

He frowned at the demon. "And why would I take your word on that?"

"Don't. I'll bring her out of hiding for a minute or two, long enough to hold a conversation. She'll be in control. Fair?"

Dean let the pause linger as he considered, but she knew he'd say yes, and he did. She closed her eyes and concentrated. When her eyes opened again, the black had reverted to their normal brown.

"Hello?" Her voice was subtly different. A different person with the same voice box.

"Do you know where you are? How much are you aware of when you're not in control?" He was much gentler with her now.

"Um. I get some of it. It's kind of faint, and I don't normally pay much attention."

"You don't pay attention to what the demon possessing your body does in your life, using your identity?" Dean raised an eyebrow.

"No." Her tone was nearly emotionless.

Another man walked in, much taller, with longer hair and even more plaid. "Why not?" he asked, frowning, sitting carefully outside the devil's trap.

"Because I'm done living. I tried to kill myself before she found me. I gave myself to her when she explained it all to me. She needs a body and I don't want mine. This way, everybody wins. Nobody has to grieve for me, and I'll just slowly fade out of existence in the back of my mind."

Her cool logic seemed to chill the newcomer. "You don't have to give up," he told her, "just keep fighting-"

"It's too late for me; I'm half gone already," she cut him off. "Save the suicide speech for someone not possessed, okay? I knew what I was doing when I let her in. I'm okay with this. She's not doing anything wrong, just living my unwanted life."

She could see he still wanted to argue, but Dean stopped him. "Sam, this girl is past your help. This isn't someone you can actually make a difference about. Cut the poetry and the puppy face."

Sam didn't look like he agreed, but before he said anything, Dean asked her, "Can you bring her back? The demon, I mean. I'd like a word."

"Wait!" said Sam, and she did. "What's your name?"

She smiled, caught off-guard. "My name? I'm- I'm Melissa. Thanks, Sam."

Melissa closed her eyes. Dean looked at Sam. "Her name? How did you know she wanted you to ask?"

Sam shrugged. "She just wanted to be heard. To not be alone. I was only trying to remind her of who she had been, once, before she'd fade all the way. She deserves that much."

"Very nice," she said, and the brothers jumped; they hadn't noticed her eyes opening, black once more. "She really appreciated that."

"So now what?" said Dean flatly.

She spoke quickly, before Sam could answer. "Please, you can't send me back there. You heard her, I'm not doing anything wrong. I can't go back. Please. _Please_."

"What makes you different from any other demon out there?" Dean spat.

"I don't know," she said, and he wasn't expecting that. An argument, sure, but her admitting that wasn't in his game plan. She said it again. "I don't know. All I know is that I can't go back. Do you know how long I spent there? In the flames and the dark? In pain every second?"

"No," said Sam before Dean could tell him to ignore her.

"Me neither," she told him. "I've forgotten. Time blends together after the first few centuries of torture. And you know what else? I don't even remember what I did to end up there. I could have been a mass murderer, or just someone like you who made a bad deal. I don't know what I did. Does it still count as my action, my deed? Haven't I been punished long enough? I've been suffering for millennia for something I can't recall doing."

Sam glanced at Dean. She knew what he was thinking about.

"Yes. That's what awaits you. How much time do you have left, Dean? You'll know exactly what I went through, and I hope you think of me when you do."

Dean looked uncomfortable. _Good_ , she thought.

She pressed on. "But if you let me go, you won't have to regret this meeting. I'll live out Melissa's life peacefully, a second chance. And you won't have me on your conscience, knowing you sent me back to the situation you're in."

Sam nudged Dean. "She's got a point," he said quietly. "Dean, you've got months left, and she hasn't done anything wrong except accept a willing vessel. Maybe she's right."

"Think of it this way," she added. "If you let me go, and then go down and somehow get out as a demon like me, like I did, you'll be able to tell whoever finds you that you let me go. You have a reputation. If Dean Winchester lets a demon go if they deserve it, another hunter can release you."

There were tears in her eyes now, and she knew he saw them. "I just want to live. To be free. That's all I'm asking. If I ever hurt anyone you're welcome to come back and make me pay for it. But I won't. Please, Dean- Sam, please. I just-"

"Your voice," said Dean sharply.

"What?" She blinked away tears.

"That was Melissa's voice. The way she sounded when she was in charge. Or when you said she was. We never spoke to your vessel, did we?"

She blinked again. Sam stood up and she looked to him, expecting she didn't know what-defense maybe, but: "He's right, isn't he?"

"It was all lies," Dean growled. She looked back to him in a panic.

"No! No, it wasn't! Dean, I wasn't lying, I wasn't!"

"Did Melissa speak to us, or not?" he demanded.

"...Well, no," she admitted reluctantly.

Sam bit his lip. She faced him because she couldn't bear to see Dean's face, terrible in its anger. "But I swear everything else was true! Everything she said- I said- was true, except that Melissa is too close to death to talk to you. But if she could she'd have said exactly what I did! Please, you've got to believe me!"

Her eyes were wide with fear, brimming with tears. It would have been moving, except that her eyes turned black again when she blinked.

"I thought you'd be more likely to believe her than me, so I pretended to be her. I didn't say anything else untrue, really, I didn't. Please, you've got to believe me, you've got to! Sam!" She appealed to the one who had been more sympathetic to her, but his face was closed off.

"What'd I say, Sammy?" Dean muttered viciously. "Stinking demons can't tell the truth to save their own skin. Now give me the book or do it yourself." He reached out a hand. Sam hesitated a moment before handing him the book of exorcisms.

"Please!" she screamed. "Don't do this!"

Dean began reading. "Exorcizamus te..."

Sam watched her struggle against her bonds. "Dean, what if-"

But Dean wouldn't stop to listen. "Ergo, draco malidecte..."

"No!" Tears poured down her face. Genuine, true human tears.

Sam couldn't stay silent. "You're not helping Melissa, Dean, and no one else was hurt. Why are you so insistent on doing this?"

Dean ignored him. He was nearly done with the exorcism.

"I think," said Sam, loudly to be heard over the Latin, "you just don't want to think about how this could be you."

In spite of himself, Dean looked at her. His chanting faltered for a second before he quickly looked back to the book and resumed, louder than before.

"Dean, you can't keep ignoring your problems!" The wailing was getting louder, and so was Dean. Sam was shouting to be heard over all the noise. "Why don't you ever listen to me?"

Dean had reached the last sentence of the exorcism. He spoke the words with a grim finality, now sweating, as though his struggle had been physical rather than internal.

The girl in the chair shrieked and released the cloud of black smoke; the demon faded, pulled back into hell. The body slumped.

Sam rushed over to Melissa. "Life signs are fading quickly," he said urgently. "Melissa, can you hear me? Melissa?"

"Why did he do that?" she mumbled.

"What? Who did what?" He bent closer. Dean stood in the same place, unmoving, still holding the book open.

"Why did he bring me back? I don't want to be here." Her voice was weak.

"No, don't say that, stay with me," said Sam desperately, fingers on Melissa's slowing pulse.

"Why?" And with that she closed her eyes. A moment later Sam stood up, not looking at Dean.

"I'm sorry," he told the dead girl, and left the room.

 _Me too_ , Dean might have thought.

But there were monsters out there to kill. People to save, things to hunt. Business. Dean Winchester couldn't take a moment to think about what had just happened.

 _Just another demon_ , he told himself, and tried not to think about a time when some other hunter would say the same of him.

**Author's Note:**

> IF YOU ARE HAVING SUICIDAL THOUGHTS, PLEASE SEEK HELP.
> 
> National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 1-800-273-8255  
> Depression Hotline: 1-630-482-9696  
> Suicide Hotline: 1-800-784-8433  
> Eating Disorder Hotline: 1-847-831-3438
> 
> Please stay safe. You're not alone, I promise.


End file.
